Working of an IR Sensor

Hey Folks!!!!. Today I am back with a fantastic instructable post. Today's post is all about the Ir sensors. If you have experience working with electronics or robotics, I am pretty sure you must have heard about Ir sensors. If you haven't, don't worry, I got your back, so make sure to read this post till the end to learn something pretty cool. Let's go.

1. Ir Sensor

Ir sensor or Infrared sensor is a sensor that emits infrared light to sense the objects around it. It has various implications; however, it is most commonly used in creating Line follower cars using Arduino or for Motion Detection. Sir William Herschel accidentally discovered infrared Radiation in the year 1800. The fun part about infrared light is that it is not visible to the human eye due to its higher wavelength compared to the visible light

The working of infrared sensors is pretty simple. They work on the basic principle of reflecting light. The Ir light from the Ir transmitter is emitted, and once it hits a surface and bounces back, the Photodiode detects the Ir Light, and in this way, sensors get to know there is an object in front of it.

The Above Mentioned explanation is for a type of sensor called Active Infrared Sensors. There is also another type called Passive Infrared Sensors or PIR sensors. Still, we won't talk about them today as sensors like Pir motion sensor come under this category, and their working is different as they don't emit light from it led.

The Ir sensors will not make a big hole in your wallet. The typical price range of Ir senor ranges from 1$ to 2$ per sensor. The price depends on the type of sensor you are buying. The price may differ from one region to another. To buy the Ir sensor for a possible cheap price, I would suggest purchasing the sensors from Aliexpress.

The cheap Ir sensors don't usually have a specific brand, so the company won't matter while choosing cheap sensors.

Ir sensors for Arduino are of various types quite popular ones are the Generic Ir sensor, TCRT5000 Ir sensor.

The TCRT5000 sensor comes in 2 variants itself. The first one has only analog Output while another variant supports both Analog and Digital Output and has separate output pins for the same. These sensors are Passive sensors and there is also another category called Passive Infrared(PIR). These sensors have different working than the Active Ir sensors. I will talk about them in future instructable Posts

Ir sensors have a variety of implications as they are not only used with Arduino but can also be used in various other cases. A few of their use cases include Sorting Devices, Line Detectors, Motion Detectors, Flame Detectors, Burglar Alarms, Counter Devices, etc.

Well, That's it for today's instructable. I hope you got some knowledge from it and this instructable was helpful to you.

Make sure to Favourite this Instructable and comment below any questions or suggestions that you might have. I will make sure to answer them.

ThankYou :)